Things aren't terrible for Penn State (maybe), and shame on Iowa

ALTOONA, Pa. -- If you would have asked anyone familiar with Penn State football back in April or August or last week what the biggest key is to this season, you would have gotten this universal response:

Sean Clifford.

Now we know why.

But we've always known. As I've pointed out many, many times in preview stories or preseason radio interviews, Clifford is the most important player to his team in all of college football.

That was never meant to suggest that Clifford was anywhere near the best player in college football. He's not. But we've all known for many months that there was a massive dropoff from Clifford to backup quarterback Ta'Quan Roberson.

Given that, what we saw from Roberson in Saturday's 23-20 loss at Iowa really shouldn't have been a surprise.

Let's get into all of this with a good news, bad news edition of Sunday observations.

Good news: If Clifford can come back to play without missing significant time, Penn State still has a great chance to enjoy a fantastic season. And perhaps even still earn a berth in the College Football Playoff.

Why? ...

Good news: I'm one of the few people from these parts who picked Iowa to beat Penn State beat. So I was right. But I also was wrong.

I thought Iowa was the better team going in.

I was wrong about that.

I thought Penn State had a lot of questions it still needed to answer, and I wasn't sold on the Nittany Lions yet simply because they were 5-0 with a couple of wins over a poor Wisconsin team and a mediocre Auburn team.

Yes, Penn State lost to Iowa. But I actually came away from that game feeling better about the Lions' long-term chances than I did going into Saturday.

With Clifford playing and picking apart Iowa's defense, the Lions built a 17-3 lead by the opening minutes of the second quarter. I have no doubt that, had Clifford remained in the game, Penn State would have won easily.

That gives me a whole lot of reason for optimism for the rest of the season -- IF Clifford is able to return.

That IF is the biggest factor left in this season.

Furthermore, I actually like Penn State's chances of winning at Ohio State in three weeks even more today than I did before the Iowa game. Now, I am still going to pick the Buckeyes to beat the Lions heading into that contest. I believe Ohio State has figured out a lot of its problems and, by the time Oct. 30 rolls around, will be a much different team than the one that lost at home to Oregon.

But I saw enough from Penn State on Saturday -- with Clifford in the game -- to buy into the possibility that the Lions could indeed have a chance to win at Columbus.

Bad news: Scratch everything I just said if Clifford can't play. Because if Roberson is the quarterback when the Lions play in the Horseshoe, then the Buckeyes are going to pound Penn State.

Why? ...

Bad news: I just don't think Roberson is very good. I don't really want to overly criticize the young man because he is still a college kid. But at the same time, this is big-time college football, and we have to tell it like it is because there's a lot at stake.

He was 7-of-21 for 34 yards and two interceptions in 2 1/2 quarters. I find it nearly impossible to believe that a quarterback in a Mike Yurcich offense would only have 34 yards passing in 2 1/2 quarters, but we just saw it.

I didn't really like what I saw from Roberson in the two open scrimmages at Beaver Stadium in April. Here's what I wrote after the second one for Nittany Sports Now:

I’m still not at all convinced that the backup QB is currently on the roster. Ta’Quan Roberson has a lot of tools, is a good scrambler and has a nice arm. But his accuracy is a concern, based on the two scrimmages.

Bad news: I cannot believe that Penn State didn't go get another QB in the transfer portal. I wrote back in March that it would be stunning if the Lions don't bring in a transfer quarterback to compete for the backup job, for the reasons that we saw play out Saturday night.

OK, so let's play the blame game. Because we're always looking for somebody to blame after a loss, right?

I'll keep it simple:

1. Either we blame Roberson for just not being very good, or

2. We blame James Franklin for either not developing Roberson or not realizing he isn't very good and failing to bring in someone else to be the potential backup.

I think both things can be true at the same time.

Again, I'm not just gonna bash Roberson. It is what it is. He was a 4-star recruit who's been at Penn Sate for three years, and yet his performance Saturday made him look completely incapable of being a solid college quarterback.

Still, Franklin and Yurcich got a ton of criticism Saturday night and Sunday for not coaching up Roberson and putting him in better positions to succeed. I can buy into that, sure. But at the same time, coaches can't go out and make the plays for the players, and Roberson had opportunities to make plays and didn't do so.

Yurcich could have called better plays for Roberson. And you'd have to think Roberson knows the entire playbook at this stage, although maybe we shouldn't assume that given that he has probably taken very, very few first-team reps with Clifford ahead of him.

Bad news: As for not getting another QB from the transfer portal, there are two schools of thought there.

Certainly, any QB in the portal wanted to go somewhere he would get a chance to play or at least an opportunity to compete for the starting job.

Penn State couldn't offer that, not with Clifford back as a third-year starter.

So yeah, Franklin's options probably were limited in the portal.

But c'mon. Franklin is a tremendous recruiter. A tremendous salesman. He has great charisma and appeal.

You mean to tell me he couldn't find ONE KID who has some experience to come and be the backup at Penn State?

My guess is -- and there's no way to know this for sure -- that Franklin wasn't fully sold on the idea that he even needed another quarterback. He figured he had a highly recruited player in Roberson, so he decided to roll the dice that Clifford wouldn't get hurt and that, if he did, at some point Roberson would figure everything out and be a capable backup.

Good news: It's not impossible for Roberson to do just that -- figure some things out so that he can become a decent option if he has to keep playing.

Penn State has a bye this week. Then it hosts Illinois next week, and that's a game the Lions should be able to win with their defense and even a mediocre offense.

If Clifford can't play, then Roberson will have two weeks of getting all the first-team reps and experience in practice. He will know that he is the man now, that everyone is depending on him, and maybe you can count on his natural skills and competitiveness to take his game to a higher level than the public has seen so far.

Good news: With the bye and Illinois, Clifford has three weeks to get back healthy before it actually may hurt the team any further.

We have no idea what his status is, and we probably won't get any updates from Franklin, unless Clifford does indeed have some type of season-ending injury. This is a coach, mind you, who doesn't even release a depth chart, so why would he show his hand at all with any information about his quarterback situation?

We may have to wait until right before kickoff against Illinois to find out if Clifford can play.

Bad news: If Clifford can't return, we have to start wondering how many more games Penn State will win this season.

The Lions should be able to beat Illinois with Roberson. But there's no way they'll beat Ohio State with him.

The rest of the schedule is at Maryland, vs. Michigan, vs. Rutgers, at Michigan State. Can the Lions beat any of those teams with Roberson at QB? 

Not if he plays like he did at Iowa.

The bottom line: This season hinges on Clifford's health. We knew that months ago, and it's crystal clear now.

Bad news: There are other injuries to be concerned about, to defensive tackle PJ Mustipher, safety Jonathan Sutherland and running backs Devyn Ford and John Lovett. Mustipher would be a big loss if he's out for an extended period, and Sutherland does so many things for the team.

Horrible news: Iowa should be ashamed for how its fans and even coaches on the sideline conducted themselves when Penn State players went down with injuries. They felt the PSU players were faking it in order to stop the clock when Iowa's offense was on the field.

Give me a break. These were some of Penn State's best players going down, and that doesn't happen to try and slow down an already slow and methodical Iowa offense.

This video in particular shows an Iowa assistant mocking Arnold Ebiketie after he got hurt briefly, with the coach acting on the sideline by falling down.

This is a disgrace.

UPDATE: The Iowa coach above apparently is claiming Ebiketie was faking the injury. There's a video circulating on Twitter showing a highlighted Ebiketie still running during the play before he went down to the turf. But the play BEFORE showed this, with Ebiketie hurting his right leg but staying in the game. This play is hugely important context to the entire ensuing sequence.

Both videos can be seen here:

PREVIOUS UPDATE: I've got an Iowa fan in the comments criticizing me for calling out the Hawkeye fans and coaches over this. I am posting my full response to that person that is in the comments:

Absurd. I'm not getting into a pissing war over this with anybody. The Iowa folks were completely classless for how they handled this.

How stupid would Penn State have to be to have its best defensive players keep going down faking injuries? Arnold Ebiketie (17) is a future NFL player who has been a stud all season. Do you honestly believe Penn State has such a BS program that it is SO AFRAID OF IOWA'S MEDIOCRE OFFENSE that it would have its best players fake injuries?

It's laughable.

Penn State lost 5 guys to injuries: DT PJ Mustipher was on crutches. QB Sean Clifford was knocked out of game (didn't delay game). Safety Jonathan Sutherland was knocked out of game. RBs John Lovett and Devyn Ford got hurt.

That's three of the team's captains in Mustipher, Clifford and Sutherland.

It was 80 degrees there at kickoff. Guys get cramps. Iowa is a tough, physical team that was hitting the PSU guys hard. Injuries happen in those situations.

Penn State has NEVER, EVER pulled crap like that where it fakes injuries. Against anyone. I've covered the Lions for 16 years and have NEVER seen it once. The Iowa folks are pretending like the Hawkeyes' offense was so fierce, so fast and so dangerous that Penn State had to resort to faking injuries.

It's ridiculous to think that.

For the Iowa fans to boo injured players was pathetic.

For the Iowa coach to act and fall down on the sideline mocking an injured player was pathetic.

I don't care if they thought it was because Penn State was faking it. The Lions had injured players on the field, and the crowd was booing. That's incredibly unbecoming, to use your word.

I lost all respect for Iowa and how it handles things over this. It was an absolute disgrace to sportsmanship, and I don't care what anybody from Iowa thinks when it comes to defending those classless actions.

POLL RESULTS

Penn State dropped from No. 4 to No. 7 in the AP poll, while falling to No. 8 in the coaches poll. Here's a look at the entire rankings.

The Big Ten has half of the teams ranked in the top 10: Iowa (2), Ohio State (6), Penn State (7), Michigan (8) and Michigan State (10).

Note that Alabama is still ranked ahead of Penn State. That's interesting, although not unexpected, considering the Tide had a worse loss than Penn State. Alabama fell at unranked Texas A&M, which was playing its backup QB, while Penn State almost certainly would have beaten the No. 3 team on its home field had its starting quarterback remained in the game.

But Alabama is Alabama, and it will always get the benefit of the doubt in just about any situation. (I explain my thinking a bit more in the comments for anyone interested in this topic.)